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Toho animated films

  • My Neighbor TotoroMy Neighbor Totoro, a 1988 Japanese animated fantasy film written and directed by Hayao Miyazaki, opens on a family driving to an old house in the…
  • Tales from Earthsea (film)Tales from Earthsea arrived in Japanese cinemas on the 29th of July 2006, carrying more weight than most debut films. Its director, Gorō Miyazaki, was making…
  • Spirited AwaySpirited Away opens on a ten-year-old girl named Chihiro Ogino riding in her parents' imported Audi, sulking about moving to a new neighborhood.
  • Macross: Do You Remember Love?Macross: Do You Remember Love? opens not at the beginning of a war, but in the middle of one. The year is 1984, and audiences filing into Japanese cinemas on…
  • The Cat ReturnsIn 1995, Studio Ghibli released a film titled Whisper of the Heart. That project introduced Baron, a cat figurine who came to life within a fantasy sequence.
  • The Tale of the Princess Kaguya (film)The Tale of the Princess Kaguya arrived in Japanese cinemas on the 23rd of November 2013 as the most expensive Japanese film ever made, carrying a budget of…
  • Princess MononokePrincess Mononoke arrived in Japanese cinemas on the 12th of July, 1997, and within days the newspapers had a name for what was happening: the "Mononoke…
  • Only Yesterday (1991 film)"Only Yesterday" cost its color department roughly a year of searching for a single shade of red. The goal was accurately capturing the safflower in summer…
  • Pom PokoPom Poko, a 1994 animated film from Studio Ghibli, opens not with heroes or villains but with raccoon dogs fighting each other over scraps of shrinking…
  • PonyoPonyo begins with a goldfish-like creature trapped inside a glass jar, drifting toward shore on the back of a jellyfish.
  • When Marnie Was There (film)When Marnie Was There, released in Japanese theaters on the 19th of July 2014, begins with a question most children have asked in some form: does anyone…
  • Whisper of the HeartWhisper of the Heart is a 1995 Japanese animated film that begins with a small, almost invisible mystery: a girl notices that every library book she picks up…
  • ArriettyArrietty is a 2010 Japanese animated fantasy film from Studio Ghibli, and it carries with it a question that has haunted filmmakers for decades: how do you…
  • The Wind RisesThe Wind Rises opens not with a battle or a disaster, but with a boy's dream. In 1918, Jiro Horikoshi longs to fly. His eyes are too weak to let him be a…
  • Akira (1988 film)Akira exploded onto Japanese screens on the 16th of July 1988, the same date the film's own story marks as the day Tokyo was obliterated by a mysterious…
  • Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba – The Movie: Mugen Train"Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba , The Movie: Mugen Train" became the highest-grossing film of 2020. That year, COVID-19 had shuttered or reduced theaters…
  • Mary and the Witch's FlowerIn front of the press on the 15th of December 2016, director Hiromasa Yonebayashi introduced Mary and the Witch's Flower with a single line.
  • Porco RossoPorco Rosso is a 1992 Japanese animated film by Hayao Miyazaki about a man who has become a pig. Not metaphorically. Marco Pagot, an Italian ace from the…
  • The Boy and the HeronThe Boy and the Heron, a 2023 fantasy film from Hayao Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli, reached Japanese theaters behind a single poster and nothing else.
  • The Red TurtleThe Red Turtle opens on a man clinging to wreckage in the open sea. A storm has just swept over him, and next he wakes alone on a beach.
  • Pokémon: The First MoviePokémon: The First Movie opened on a Wednesday in November 1999, and so many children skipped school to see it that the day earned its own nickname: the…
  • Your NameYour Name began, in a sense, on the ruined streets of a fishing village called Yuriage. Its director, Makoto Shinkai, visited the town in July 2011, months…
  • Howl's Moving Castle (film)Howl's Moving Castle arrived in Japanese cinemas on the 20th of November 2004, carrying more emotional weight than most animated films dare to attempt.
  • Royal Space Force: The Wings of HonnêamiseRoyal Space Force: The Wings of Honnêamise began not in a studio but in a proposal handed to a toy company executive in September 1984.